DLC: A LitRPG Adventure (Beta Tester Book 4)

by Rachel Ford

  Karag, meanwhile, read, “Mother Gryla, and her thirteen sons: coal. There’s no mistake, Jack. And as such, I really would advise you don’t eat cookies brought to you by someone on Father Winter’s naughty list.”

  The kitten wrapped itself around Jack’s feet, purring loudly. He ignored the other man’s advice and took a bite of cookie. It was one of the best treats he’d eaten so far. “Winter must have marked it wrong. You saw her: how could such a nice old lady get coal for Christmas? And what a rotten trick too, when you can see they’re clearly not doing as well as their neighbors. And here she is, working into the early hours of the morning; and we’re supposed to leave her coal?” He shook his head, exasperated by Winter’s mismanagement.

  “Perhaps the sons are terrors.”

  Jack, though, just shook his head again. “I don’t believe it. She’s far too nice for that. No, Karag, we need to find gifts for them.”

  The giant made a face. “I really don’t think we should do that. Miss Winter asked us –”

  Jack took another bite from his cookie and washed it down with milk. The kitten kept purring away at his feet. No one, he decided, who could make a cookie like this for a complete stranger, deserved a lump of coal. “No. We’re going to…”

  But he cut off, quite suddenly. His mouth seemed unable to work beyond a muffled murmur. But it wasn’t just his mouth. His legs and arms seemed to have frozen up as well.

  Karag watched him, frowning. “Jack?”

  He tried to respond, to say anything at all. But it came out only as a kind of half strangled grunt. Then, the kitten pushed its tiny body against his leg again; and Jack, unable to demand even the faintest compliance from his limbs, toppled to the ground with the pressure.

  Karag rushed over to him, and to the glass of milk and plate of cookies that clattered to the ground with his fall. He lifted the glass and sniffed it. “Blast. Paralyzing poison. I knew we shouldn’t trust her.”

  Jack tried to order his companion to help him. But he couldn’t speak, and Karag seemed to have other ideas in mind. He raced back to the sack he’d left lying on the ground and started fishing through it. One by one, he pulled out fourteen lumps of coal. Jack, meanwhile, lay on the ground, grunting and murmuring in angry incoherence.

  He was paralyzed in place, vulnerable and unable to do a thing to escape, and Karag was concerned about coal? He wanted to throttle the other man. Not that he could move to lift a finger to him, but the idea satisfied anyway.

  Then the door opened, and old mother Gryla entered a second time. But now, she wasn’t wearing a sweet smile. She didn’t look like a harried old woman, bustling about her Christmas preparations. She wore a wicked smile and carried a huge meat cleaver.

  “Took your sweet time drinking your milk, didn’t you, my lad?”

  Jack murmured out a muffled plea.

  She laughed. “I can’t understand you, dearie, but it wouldn’t make any nevermind if I could. I told you: I have thirteen pies to make for Christmas day, and thirteen boys to feed. We’ve been waiting for hours for you to show up.”

  At that precise moment, while Karag still sorted through coal, the far door opened. Thirteen boys, all dressed in festive Christmas garb, poured into the room. “He’s a bit scraggly, isn’t he, ma?” said one.

  “Not much meat on him,” said another.

  “There’s two of them,” she reminded the boys. “And lean meat is good meat. You leave it to your mom. These will be the best Christmas pies you ever did have. Much better than last year, when we chewed your father’s dusty old bones.”

  The boys nodded all in unison at that. Karag, meanwhile, had finished his work with the sack and gone to the mantle. He was frantically dropping chunks of coal into the stockings. “One…two…three…”

  “Now,” Gryla said, apparently to the cat, “I’ll take care of this one. You go get the big fellow.” She advanced on Jack, meat cleaver at the ready. And the kitten chirped; and suddenly grew, and grew, until he was as tall as Karag.

  The giant seemed to sense the commotion, because he threw a glance over his shoulder. His eyes bulged. But he kept up his work, still balancing the sack on one shoulder. “Nine…ten…”

  The boys, meanwhile, started to sing, their sopping wet tongues lolling hungrily out of their mouths like a dog’s might.

  Carve their bones up right

  For your Yule Lads are hungry tonight

  Put them in a pie delight

  For the Yule Cat, feed his spite

  Mother Gryla, feed us all

  Eat, eat, eat, eat…

  They went on chanting eat in a terrible, orcish way: loud and cruel and insatiable. The enormous cat pounced for Karag, who was still counting out coal. “Thirteen…fourteen.”

  And Mother Gryla raised her horrible cleaver for Jack. He tried to fight. He tried to free himself from the paralysis. But there was no getting away. So he closed his eyes as the cleaver began its downward arc toward his skull.

  And then, something grabbed him and hauled him out of the way. Jack opened his eyes. He saw Karag’s hand, pulling him along, and Mother Gryla snarling, trying to yank her cleaver free. But it was stuck deep in a floorboard where Jack’s head had been a moment earlier. He saw the Yule Cat bounding after them, only a breath away. Its tiny kitten eyes had grown huge like the rest of it and gleamed with a murderous intensity. And he saw the Yule Lads, their hungry drooling mouths turned into ugly snarls of their own. They all brandished weapons and demanded that he stop.

  Mother Gryla called out, “You wouldn’t starve hungry boys, would you? Not on Christmas?”

  The boys called, “You won’t get away from us.”

  Then he saw nothing at all for a moment, and he realized they’d reached the chimney. They emerged a moment later into the cold, crisp night air. Jack was still paralyzed, and still unable to speak.

  Karag shifted him over one shoulder, and the sack over the other. He marched toward the sleigh and deposited each – Jack and sack – without much ceremony onto the seat. Then he took his own position at the reins and threw a disappointed glance Jack’s way. “Well,” he said, “I do believe that’s me being three for three.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  The paralysis potion did not at once relinquish its hold on Jack’s body. Karag declared, “Well, it’s no matter. The clock is ticking, and I can see to the deliveries. You can stay there.”

  Jack, of course, had no say in the matter for the very simple reason that he couldn’t speak. So he lay there, reduced to incoherent grunts and murmurs, as Karag took the sleigh to first one home and then another, and another.

  All in all, he finished five deliveries before Jack’s vocal cords responded to his will. It took longer for the rest of him. But the vocal cords were all he needed. Because, after Karag’s fourth solo run, the game alerted Jack that he’d met the threshold he needed to complete the mission. He’d delivered all the coal and fifty percent of the gifts on his list.

  So as soon as his voice returned, he murmured a weary, “Get me out of here, Karag.”

  “Out of the sleigh? Are you sure that’s wise? You don’t look up to walking.”

  “No, out of Pleasant Vale. Get me back to the North Pole, and out of this stupid Christmas town.”

  Karag frowned at him. “We’re far from completing our deliveries.”

  “I don’t give a rat’s tushy about the deliveries,” Jack said, though of course he’d had quite another word in mind than tushy. “We got through half of them, and that’s good enough.”

  “I really do feel that we should –”

  “No,” Jack snapped, and his tone was a little sharper than it might otherwise have been on account of the fact that his voice was the only manner of expressing himself he still had open. “I said get us out of here, and I meant it. I don’t care what your reasons are, and I don’t care who does or doesn’t get a present. I’m tired, and I’m cold, and I feel like I’m going to puke. So take me home.”

  Karag d
id as he was told. But he apparently couldn’t refrain from observing, a bit acidly, “Well, I’m not surprised your stomach is unsettled after all the cookies you ate. And I doubt the poison did anything to help. If only someone had warned you…”

  Jack scowled at the other man but could think of no rejoinder – not least of all because the points were fair. He’d been warned, and he’d been foolish and greedy. So he sat there in sullen silence for a long space.

  Use of his limbs returned to him by time they were about halfway back to the North Pole. That improved his mood, if only a little. He was still stiff and cold; but at least he wasn’t a stiff, cold heap of immovable flesh.

  Estelle was waiting for them in the great, snowy courtyard of the ice palace. A kind of runway had been cordoned off for them with strings of Christmas lights, and she stood at the far end. Karag set down beside her. She greeted them warmly, then inquired, “Tell me, did you finish all the deliveries?”

  “About half of them,” Jack admitted.

  “Oh,” she said, and there was no mistaking the disappointment in her tone or expression.

  “We ran into – difficulties. In Gryla’s house. You know, the old witch with the thirteen little cannibal sons? She almost baked us up in Christmas pies.”

  Estelle nodded gravely. “A wicked family, that.”

  “Yeah. If only someone warned me…” Jack said.

  Karag snorted, muttering under his breath, “As if you’d have listened anyway.”

  “Well, you did your best, and you got out before she put you in a pie.” Estelle smiled brightly, and the sunshine of her expression drove away some of his dark mood. “I have a gift for you – a thank you, for carrying on my father’s legacy when I could not.”

  That brightened Jack’s mood a little more yet. “Oh? What kind of gift?”

  She smiled at his tone, and then nodded to someone in the darkness. Jack couldn’t see who, but in a minute they stepped into the light. It was Elfkin, but he wasn’t alone. He led a tiny golden beast on a leash.

  “Uh…what is that?” Jack wondered. It looked like a cross between a dragon and some kind of horrid, snaggletoothed goblin.

  “It’s Sol, a light dragon. He’s newly hatched, and we thought he would make a marvelous pet.”

  Elfkin pushed a leash into Jack’s hand, seeming to miss his reluctance to take it. “He’ll eat just about anything, and he hunts his own food. He’ll be no trouble at all – at least, once he’s housebroken.”

  Jack surveyed the little beast. It was cute, in the way pugs or French bulldogs were cute – objectively hideous, but somehow charming anyway. It was snaggletoothed, with a lopsided half-grin and glowing golden eyes. “Uh…thanks.”

  “Oh,” Elfkin continued, “and don’t be alarmed if he roasts you now and then. He’s only playing. But they tend to get a little carried away, you know, and not realize that their limits are a little more advanced than ours.”

  “Great.”

  Elfkin turned to leave but paused. “And one more thing: he tends to, well, fart after he feeds. Some dragons do.”

  “Terrific. What a great pet.”

  Elfkin nodded. “The smell is bad, but make sure you stay out of the, uh, firing range. If you’re too close, it’ll melt your flesh right off your bones.”

  Jack scowled at the little elf, who scampered away without seeming to notice the expression.

  “Do you like him?” Estelle asked.

  “Well…to be honest…” He stopped himself before answering. Instead, he said, “Speak to supervisor.”

  The game paused, and a voice called out of the shadows, “Yo, Jack. What am I doing over here? Hold on.”

  He couldn’t see the dwarf to gauge his expressions, but Jack nonetheless recognized the speaker as Richard. He had his own unique brand of annoying, and it was highly recognizable. A minute later, Migli jogged into sight, asking, “What’s up, dude?” Then, he surveyed Sol, and laughed. “Oh, you got the ugly one, huh?”

  Jack frowned at him. “What do you mean? Am I supposed to get a choice or something?”

  “Naw. You must have bombed your quest, right?”

  “No. I didn’t bomb it.”

  Migli arched an eyebrow. “Really? Then what are you doing with Sol?”

  “That’s what I wanted to ask you, actually.”

  Richard laughed. “Estelle gives you dragons based on your performance. Same way Krampus gave you the snakes. The better you do, the better your pet.

  “You got the bottom tier dragon, my dude: the barely scraped by, by the skin of my teeth dragon.”

  Jack sighed. “Can I just play without getting any pet? I’m sick of them all.”

  But Migli shook his head. “Nope. You end up with one no matter what. If you did a good job, you could have ended up with a really cool dragon. There’s some fire and ice ones that rock.” He shrugged. “Or, you can scrape by, and get Sol.”

  “Thanks, Richard. You’re a huge help.”

  “Any time. Oh, by the way – the ultimate dragon? You know, the one you get if you deliver everything, and finish all the bonus objectives?”

  Jack wasn’t particularly interested, but it seemed he was doomed to find out anyway. So, figuring it was better to cut straight to the chase, he asked, “What about it?”

  “Jordan designed it. It’s really cool. Plus, it doesn’t fart, or crap all over you. Too bad you wussed out on the mission.”

  Jack kept the game paused after Richard went back to his own work. He checked his clock. He still had eight hours before Jordan’s next shift. He glanced at the monstrous little gremlin Estelle had gifted him. He thought about spending the rest of the game with a dragon that hadn’t been housebroken, and that leaked toxic gases.

  He thought about surprising Jordan, after her annoyance with him – completely unjustified though it had been. At their last meeting, he’d been playing on Team Krampus. Wouldn’t she be surprised, he thought, if he showed up not only having switched sides, but having won the best dragon in the game – her dragon?

  He tossed the idea around for a while. He really did want to get out of here as soon as possible, so he could get on with the main quest, and get out of the game. But he didn’t want to be stuck with Sol for the rest of the game, either. He had a good reason for replaying.

  Surprising Jordan would just be a happy bonus.

  So Jack pulled up his game saves and scrolled through the auto saves. Sure enough, the game had saved as soon as he landed on Mayor Cristobal’s roof.

  He thought for a long moment, a little about suffering through the game with Sol at his side, and a lot about Jordan’s disappointment with him.

  Then, he sighed and reloaded.

  He and Karag were still seated in the sleigh. The giant glanced over at him. “We should take the wand of good tidings. You never know who will need our help.”

  Jack shook his head. “No. I want to be done in time to surprise Jordan.”

  Karag frowned at him, repeating, “Jordan?”

  “Uh…nevermind. I just mean, we’re on the clock.”

  “Yes. But, we may be able to do some real good, Jack. That is why Estelle gave it to you.”

  He was about to argue the point when he remembered his optional objective:

  Use the wand to help residents in immediate need.

  Richard had mentioned that Jordan’s dragon was the best in the game, and could only be unlocked if you aced the deliveries and completed the optional objectives. So he groaned, “Fine. Let’s take it.”

  They did, and then went about their business much as before. This time, Jack focused less on eating cookies, and more on completing the mission. Indeed, he was so focused on delivering gifts that Karag had to warn him more than once to slow down lest he wake someone.

  Still, they made good time running through the familiar path they’d first taken – beginning with the footman and housekeeper, and ending with Klaus. Jack had all but forgotten the wand by time they reached the butler’s quarters.
But as soon as they passed the bizarre display of suits, Karag said, “This is an odd business. We should see if we can find any clues as to what Mr. Klaus was doing.”

  Jack knew, of course, because he’d played the mission before: he’d been laying out his drab suits to pick one for the morrow’s festivities. “I think he’s choosing a suit.”

  “Look there, Jack, at the desk. There’s a letter, and a half-finished response. Perhaps it will contain the clues we need.”

  “Am I…supposed to read it?” he guessed.

  “Ah, with such quick wit, it’s no wonder we chose you to lead our happy band.”

  Jack frowned at the giant, but then headed over to the two missives. He only just glanced at them. They seemed to be exactly what they had been the first time. “They’re about clothes…like I said.”

  Karag said, “I wonder…do you think there’s anything we could do to help?”

  He snorted. “I’m no tailor. And you’re a wine merchant. Well, an assassin who masquerades as a wine merchant. So unless you’re also a tailor, I don’t see what we can do.”

  “If we had known about this dilemma beforehand, we could have brought a new suit from one of the workshops.”

  “Yeah, well, hindsight’s twenty-twenty. Let’s finish up here.”

  But Karag didn’t move. Instead, his voice took on a thoughtful tone. “You know, I’ll bet that if we used that wand of good tidings, we might be able to do something about it.”

  Jack blinked. “Oh. I…I guess we could try that.” He fished through his inventory for the wand and pulled it out. It looked like a long icicle, but it radiated an unmistakable hum of magic. “Okay, so, how do we do this?”

  Karag shrugged. “I don’t know. But if it were me, I’d pick one of the suits he has laying out and use the wand on it. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the magic didn’t transform it.”